When I teach Alignment, one of the things we focus on is identifying things that are in our Zone of Genius versus things that are in our Zone of Frustration. (Otherwise known as the Zone of “F this!”) The idea is that you want to structure your business so that you maximize your time in your ZOG and minimize or eliminate time spent in your ZOF. (Either by dropping things from your business or delegating them to other people.)
I’ve put a lot of work into eliminating ZOF tasks in my own business over the past ten years, so imagine my surprise when, a couple of weeks ago, I found myself solidly in my Zone of Frustration.
The culprit: recording the audio version of my new book, Selling to Stores.
Now perhaps this shouldn’t come as a surprise. I’m pretty open about the fact that I don’t love creating audio content. It’s the reason I will NEVER have my own podcast. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not talking that bothers me. I LOVE talking. That’s why I’ll happily be a guest on other people’s podcasts.
No, it’s all the finicky, technical stuff that goes along with recording audio that makes my skin crawl. I’ve never been an audio geek and it’s safe to say I never will.
But the flip side is that I know how much my audience appreciates audio content. (I get it. What’s not to love about listening and learning while you work in the studio?) So I knew that, despite my frustrations, creating an audiobook for Selling to Stores would be key. Besides, I had done an audio version of Try It & See, so I could do it again, right?
Wrong. My first attempts at recording Selling to Stores were a nightmare. Even after building myself a nice little recording bunker out of blankets and clothes racks, my mic was still picking up road noise. Take two had me relocating my blanket fort to a cramped, very hot closet. I wasn’t picking up ambient noise anymore, but still I was struggling, tripping over words and dealing with a series case of cotton mouth. Then there’s the little matter of how much more there was to record for Selling to Stores compared to Try It & See.
You guys, I’m not exaggerating when I say I almost pulled the plug. I don’t not like spending time in my ZOF. I was *this* close to issuing refunds and saying that there wouldn’t be an audio version of Selling to Stores. But I didn’t.
So what changed?
It wasn’t my set-up. And I didn’t suddenly fall in love with the technical side of recording audio overnight. (And please, if you’re reading this, I don’t want your audio tips. Because honestly, I don’t care about audio. That’s the actual problem.)
No, what changed was my mindset.
I realized I was making myself frustrated because I wasn’t following one of the core tenets of Try It & See: never make anything perfect.
If we’re being honest, when I wrote that chapter of Try It & See, I really didn’t think it applied to me. I’ve never really been much of a perfectionist. When I was younger, I did have the fear of failure that comes from being a straight A student, but I managed to lighten up in college when I adopted a “done is better than perfect” approach to my art combined with an “organic” aesthetic. So it took me a while to recognize that so much of my Zone of Frustration when it comes to audio was because I had set my sites on an impossible standard.
No where else in my business do I make myself be perfect, and yet here I was, doing something that I rarely do, and feeling like I could only do it if I could do it perfectly. No wonder I was frustrated!
Spending so much time in alone with my thoughts in a blanket-lined box also led me to a major epiphany:
Perfectionism stems from the fear that your best is not good enough.
Because I came into the project believing I wasn’t good at audio, I felt like I had to hold myself to a ridiculous standard to compensate. Once I recognized that, I was able to relax and remind myself of the real reason I was recording the book in the first place: because having an audio version is convenient for my audience. And I was willing to bet that they would be happy with a “good enough” audio version to have that convenience. (And for the record, I think the audiobook version of Selling to Stores turned out better than good enough. Someone even described it as “entertaining and relatable.” Because it’s amazing what you can do when you’re relaxed and in the right head space.)
I’m not saying that every area that’s a Zone of Frustration in your business can be fixed by shifting your mindset. I still have no plans to start a podcast. And the editing portion was such a slog that I’m planning on outsourcing that for my next audiobook.
But if you do find yourself in a ZOF that you just can’t drop or outsource, its’ worth asking if you can shift your approach or your mindset to alleviate some or all of that frustration. You may never fall in love with something that started in your ZOF, but you may find it easier to get through than you first imagined. Just don’t try to make it perfect!
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If you’re curious about how you can drop those ZOFs from your business so you can spend more time in your Zone of Genius (and get paid for it), that’s something we dive deep into in the Alignment Retreat! The next live versions of the Alignment Retreat take place in February and are available exclusively to members of Artists & Profit Makers. Click here to learn more!